In the News: Grey Wolves Left Out In the Cold

Nature, Chris Woolston, September 11, 2013 (posted 09/23/13)

US plan to remove federal protection elicits howls of protest.

Central Kentucky is coyote country. But the 33-kilo­gram animal shot by a hunter near Munfordville this spring was definitely not a coyote. Its huge paws, broad snout and massive build suggested that it was a grey wolf (Canis lupus) — the first to be shot in Kentucky in more than 150 years. DNA tests confirmed the animal’s identity in August.

The animal, a possible stray from hundreds of kilometres away in Michigan or Minnesota (although it cannot be ruled out that it was once captive), was also a player in a growing debate that mixes science, politics and passionate public opinion. From Kentucky to California, wolves are forcing biologists and policy-makers to re-examine the US Endangered Species Act (ESA) and the very definition of an ‘endangered’ species.

The act, introduced in 1973, was a landmark piece of legislation. Its purpose has been contentious ever since, but it is intended to save species “in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion” of their range. Although wolves have never been at risk of extinction in the United States as a whole, those in the 48 contiguous states were classified as endangered in 1978.

After decades of federal protection and re­introduction programmes, the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) undertook a comprehensive review, which found that wolf populations near the western Great Lakes and the northern Rocky Mountains had recovered sufficiently to warrant removing ESA protection (see ‘Wolf pack’). (There are now about 4,000 wolves in the Great Lakes area and nearly 1,700 in the northern Rockies.) Wolves in these areas were ‘delisted’ between May 2011 and August 2012.

But in June this year, the FWS proposed removing ESA protection from all US grey wolves, citing the earlier review as evidence of their recovery and arguing that the original listing had erroneously included regions outside the species’ historical range (see ‘Shades of grey’). The agency says that by delisting the rest of the US wolf population, it can concentrate its resources on ESA protection for the Mexican wolf (Canis lupus baileyi), a subspecies of the grey wolf.

The proposal marks a turning point for the grey wolf. A century ago, the animals had been hunted almost out of existence south of the United States–Canada border. Now, as a result of the partial delisting, six states have wolf-hunting seasons. In Montana, 225 wolves were legally trapped or shot in the 2012–13 season.

Grey wolves removed from the ESA programme would be managed by states, some of which have in the past shown little interest in protecting wolves or expanding their territory. Delisting the wolves would essentially prevent them from reclaiming large parts of their historic range in places such as California, the southern Rockies and the northeast, says John Vucetich, a forest scientist at Michigan Technological University in Houghton. And, as the appearance of the wolf in Kentucky suggests, pushing boundaries is a wolf speciality.

“The Fish and Wildlife Service is essentially saying that this is the best that wolves can do, and it’s not even close,” he says. “Wolves are on the verge of setting a precedent for the Endangered Species Act.”

Robert Wayne, an ecologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, says that wolves need broad ranges and large populations to return to their historic levels of gene flow and diversity. In 2005, he and his colleagues analysed mitochondrial DNA from specimens collected before wolves were decimated in the 1900s, and found that it contained twice as many variations as DNA from modern wolves (J. A. Leonard et al. Mol. Ecol. 14, 9–17; 2005). The researchers estimated that the wolf populations in Mexico and the western United States had once reached 380,000 individuals. “Wolves have not recovered over a large part of their range,” Wayne says.

But Gary Frazer, assistant director for endangered species at the FWS in Arlington, Virginia, says that the service exceeded its own minimum targets for wolf recovery as early as 2001, and thus it is a case of mission accomplished. “That was the plan from the beginning: to declare recovery, to delist the species, and to move on to other species that need our attention,” he says, noting that the agency’s resources are limited.

Wolves might occupy only a fraction of their historic range, but they are not in danger of extinction, adds Mark Boyce, a biologist at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada. “We have 6,000 wolves in Alberta alone,” he says. “Except for Mexican wolves, the populations in the lower 48 states add nothing to the genetic diversity of the species.” Boyce believes that any expansion of the wolves’ range would be costly for ranchers. In 2011, he co-authored a study that tracked wolves using the Global Positioning System, showing that each wolf pack in southwestern Alberta killed an average of 17 cattle every year (A. T. Morehouse and M. S. Boyce Front. Ecol. Environ. 9, 440–445; 2011).

The wolf controversy highlights the strained relationship between science and politics. Vucetich and Wayne, along with Roland Kays of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh, were, they claim, dropped in August from a panel to review the FWS proposal because they had publicly opposed the wolf’s delisting. “I’m not mad about not being on the panel, but it doesn’t seem like they were following proper procedure,” Wayne says. “It was punitive,” he claims.

The review process has since been restarted. “We still haven’t figured out how to handle a situation where experts have outspoken views,” Frazer says. “We are not an academic institution. We’re trying to implement federal law.” The public consultation period will close in October, but because the panel’s peer review will not be complete by then, Frazer plans to reopen public comments in January 2014. “People are very passionate about wolves,” he says. The final decision may take a year or more.

The future of US wolves will hinge mainly on public acceptance of their delisting. Groups such as Defenders of Wildlife in Washington DC protest against wolf hunting, whereas those affiliated with hunters and ranchers want wolves to be aggressively controlled. Some individuals have made death threats to ranchers who legally shot wolves that attacked livestock.

Vucetich thinks that the government is eager to pass the issue on to the states. “It saps the energy of people working on it,” he says.

Please submit your comments to the Fish and Wildlife Service in support of keeping Endangered Species Protections for all wolves. CLICK HERE for talking points and contact information.

You can also help ensure Mexican wolf recovery by commenting on a second USFWS proposal of critical importance to the future of Mexican wolves - click here.___________________________________________________________________________________________

While all the organizations participating in mexicanwolves.org share the common goal of recovering the Mexican gray wolf, individual groups can, and sometimes do, differ in their approaches to specific issues.